The Walking Dead All Out War New Horizons: MyMiniFactory and the Joys of 3D Printing

[This article includes spoilers for The Walking Dead comics; Mantic Games provided the graphics, but the Tribe membership was purchased by myself.]

If you have been following the re-release of All Out War the way we have, you will undoubtedly have heard of their recent move to release STLs for the miniatures over on MyMiniFactory. Announced early in February and now launching in March, the project aims to make available the STLs and rules PDFs of the game roughly following the story arcs. The first month introduces the first third of Days Gone Bye as well as a welcome pack that contains miniatures and rules from The Prelude to Woodbury.

Contents So Far

Credit: Mantic Games

The first monthly pack includes miniatures for Days Gone Bye, the first trade paperback storyline - up until Glenn saves Rick from the tank. The rules PDF included is not the complete Days Gone Bye manual, but only the first two scenarios from the book. The rest of the scenarios will likely be included in future releases.

Credit: Mantic Games

This release schedule breaks down the original wave structure into further chapters. For those who only joined after the re-launch, the game originally released in waves loosely following chapters from the comic. A wave would be headed by a major expansion named after a chapter of the comic and followed by a number of boosters that included new survivors (up until Wave 5 after which things got muddled due to the release of Call To Arms, the 'big skirmish' ruleset).

The expansions would introduce new ways to play the game relevant to the chapter at hand (Days Gone Bye introduced camp sites and burning effects, Fear The Hunters introduced campaign play, etc.) as well as give you narrative missions based on the chapter. The first wave was called 'Days Gone Bye' and followed our survivors up until the death of Shane. Seeing as the first month gives you two out of the six scenarios from Days Gone Bye it would be prudent to assume that we will have another two months of Days Gone Bye releases, before we move on to Miles Behind Us.

It would be great if once Days Gone Bye wraps up we will get a complete PDF of it so as to not have to go through three separate files. If you cannot wait and want to keep on playing the campaign, then you can now get the PDF anthology which includes all 35 narrative missions. The monthly tribe itself only includes a quick start guide; you will find all the rules and tokens in the Prelude to Woodbury Welcome Pack which includes everything needed to play the game as well as the miniatures from Prelude to Woodbury and the four Scavengers from the original starter set (Note: the survivor cards included for the Scavengers are the ones from the starter set, rather than the 'Veteran Survivor' ones released in a booster after). If you pledge for the first month (or presumably later on) you'll get both the monthly tribe pack and the Prelude to Woodbury Welcome Pack, so you'll have the rules for the game.

As for miniatures on hand right now, you will get the following from the monthly tribe:

Rick on foot (the version from the starter set)
Rick on Horse
Morgan (the sane version)
Duane (the living version)
Glenn (Atlanta Survivor version)
3x Walkers (2x from the starter set, 1x from the Rick on Horse booster)
Morgan's Wife Walker
2x 3D Loot Markers
The iconic police duffle bag
2x 3D Barricade Markers

The selection of Walkers seems a little thin, but that is remedied by the Welcome Pack which includes the Prelude to Woodbury set that comes with:

Brian Blake (before he became the Governor)
Derek (Scavenger Leader)
Patrick
Sandra
Liam
5x Walkers from Prelude to Woodbury (one of which I am fairly certain is a zombified Jessie Anderson from the first issue of We Find Ourselves, the 15th trade paperback in the series)

The Welcome pack also includes STLs for all the tokens and dice. I have little experience with printing dice, but I think while they are nice to have and to try the game, I would personally like to replace them with cast ones. Sadly the only way to get dice right now is via the Essentials Set, which comes with the anthology all tokens and cards to play the game at the price the original starter set was, but without the miniatures. I think personally if I was new and enjoyed the game, I would probably take the money and get the essentials set from a local store since I would not want to bother printing and laminating all the cards myself. [Editor's note: It also includes a printed rulebook, measuring tools, and so on. It's pretty nice.]

Credit: Mantic Games

That leaves Month One as a decent selection of models to get your collection going. Notably though you will be missing the cars for some of the Days Gone Bye scenarios, which is a little sad since the welcome pack includes all tokens, except the cars. [Editor's Note: if you're a 3DP person then it's likely you can find some cars to print up, otherwise you can buy them at the grocery store in the toy aisle usually for $5, or get the physical Essentials set from Mantic]

How Did They Handle The Launch?

Credit: Mantic Games

I subscribed to the Tribe from day one and joined their Discord; since then I have seen the Team have to make some adjustments to many aspects of the Tribe, such as the Welcome Pack not being made available to people, the $10 Voucher not showing for people and some PDFs missing from the launch pack. There also seem to be some issues with the PDFs as the comic panels in them are a much lower resolution than the rest. Most of these were minimal issues and the team seemed pretty quick on the draw, though the issue with low resolution on the comic panels inside the PDFs has yet to be resolved.

Overall I would say that the launch is experiencing some growing pains, but is a success nonetheless and the team seems willing to listen and fix issues where they arise. They set up a Discord for the Tribe and it has been growing and expanding since the release, opening up various channels as needs arise (such as one for 3D printing advice recently). They also announced a web app in a similar vein to the Mantic Companion; I do wonder since that app has a subscription tier, how that will interact with Tribe membership.

How Do the Miniatures Compare?

Credit: Mantic Games

Since the first five waves were all cast in a PVC plastic and were mostly single piece, that lead to some issues when painting the miniatures. Namely you had an awful time removing the somewhat conspicuous mould lines and could not easily use a pressure painting handle as they would slowly warp the base. I also felt that details tended to be softer as a result of the material. Lastly there was a chemical issue that I personally had, the origin of which I have yet to figure out. Miniatures would over time become very sticky; some of the potential reasons I could find had either to do with the acetone contents of most aerosol sprays or the tight storage of the miniatures causing some kind of reaction.

Either way it was really annoying and I am happy they eventually switched to resin which resolved both issues. Now you can get some of those early PVC miniatures in 3D resin too and I am quite happy about it. The details come out nice and crisp and mould lines are non-existent as you would expect. One worry was how obtrusive the supports would be, but they were delightfully unobtrusive, the oddest was in Negan's mouth.

Credit: Momma Negan

The one downside so far is the fact that all miniatures come with integrated bases. People proficient with slicing software will have no issue removing the bases, but for everyone else it is a little inconvenient. To Mantic's credit, there is a vote going on asking if people want to stick with the integrated bases or be offered separate ones (separate bases are winning and it is not even a contest).

Credit: Momma Negan

Painting the miniatures is a treat, though that mileage may vary based on the printer available to you and how concerned you are with the finer details. I love painting miniatures to the best of my abilities, so I obviously had to go for the smoothest surface possible. At this point I am considering if I should not replace my collection with the 3D prints as they come out; they are simply so much better for painting as opposed to the PVC cast ones.

PVC Cast Martinez. Credit: Momma Negan

In conclusion, if you have a decently beefy printer (or know someone who does), then you will find literally no difference between the PVC casts and the prints (mould line excluded) and likely find a better experience overall.

What Does This Mean for the Game?

I will try and keep this short since we will go into this topic in much more depth in a later article. I think the Tribe and STLs are a step in the right direction and one that has been coming for a while. Mantic have expanded into offering STLs for a while now and it always struck me why All Out War was left out of that, but now we have the game as STLs which will certainly expand its reach to more people who either have been put off by the price, the material or sheer availability of the game. I was always in favour of Mantic taking this step and I am happy they finally did it; I will most definitely stay subscribed to the Tribe and watch with excitement where this journey goes.

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Tags: 3D printing | The Fabricator General | Walking Dead | The Walking Dead All Out War